'Beer and Ballet' Comes to The Drive

Beer and ballet. That’s how Culture Seen glibly imagined describing the 14 dancers from Ballet BC taking to the stage at the casual Dances for a Small Stage at the Legion on the Drive. The idea of sitting back and having a cold one while watching dance was too irresistible to turn down. Usually, dance is shown in more traditional venues but what could be more down market than a Royal Canadian Legion on Commercial Drive?

The only problem was that it isn’t exactly right. Oh, 14 classically-trained ballet dancers from the company will be performing at the Legion Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. But they won’t be dancing en pointe or performing, for example, selections from Swan Lake or Giselle or some other romantic-era ballet. They’ll all be dancing in contemporary works by a roster of Canadian and international artists. And that in itself in unusual.

It came about because of the friendship between Julie-anne Saroyan, now the sole artistic producer of Dances for a Small Stage, and Emily Molnar, the artistic director of Ballet BC. They knew each other form the early days of DSS when it was in a grungy back-room bar at The Rivoli at Queen and Spadina in Toronto in the early 1990s. When Molnar took over as head of Ballet BC lat year, Saroyan called her up and said would your dancers like to perform all the works at DSS 22? Molnar said yes.

It’s all part of Molnar’s cultivation of a new audience since taking over the artistic reins at BBC. Molnar is taking the company into uncharted new territory by doing things that some traditionalists would sniff their noses at – like having ballet dancers perform in a royal Canadian Legion Hall. Culture Seen recognizes that while it’s a risky move on Molnar’s part, it’s really the only way to go for Ballet BC. Molnar is working to reinvigorate ballet and bring it into the 21st century both in terms of audience development and artistic creation. When the company returns to the stage this November, one of the three new works being performed is a commission by Jose Navas, the founder and artistic director of Compagnie Flak in Montreal. The contemporary choreographer is creating a new work for dancers en pointe. It’ll be the first time the Venezuelan-born choreographer has created a contemporary ballet.

For Dance For a Small Stage, Ballet BC dancers will be performing in eight new works, including one by Gioconda Barbuto where all 14 dancers will be on the small Legion Stage at one time.Other works being performed are by Cherice Barton, Lauri Stallings, Farley Johansson, Margie Gillis, Donald Sales, Cori Caulfield and Edmond Kilpatrick. All eight works will be under 10 minutes in length.

Dances for a Small Stage 22

Where: The Legion on the Drive, 2205 Commercial Drive at East 6th, 2nd floor

When: Doors at 7 p.m., show at 8 p.m. Wednesday to Friday

Tickets: $20 cash at the door/licence limits audience members to 19 years of age and older

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